Legacy: Who Do You Want to Be When You Die?

We explore how contemplating the end can recalibrate the middle, drawing lessons from bedside moments in palliative and hospice care to ask who we are becoming and why it matters. We reset our metrics from productivity to presence and choose a path of surrender, healing, and purpose.

• the core question: who do you want to be when you die
• reputation versus integrity and the hidden, quiet self
• lessons from end‑of‑life rooms and real regrets
• death as a clarifying lens for life choices
• presence over productivity, peace over hustle
• becoming on purpose through small daily decisions
• faith, surrender, and staying rooted in what lasts
• practical self‑inventory: what forms you and what deforms you

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Today we are going to have a conversation about

(00:03):
legacy, identity, and whatreally matters.
So let's go ahead and startright here.
Not with your goals, not withyour five-year plan, not with
what you want to have, but withwho you want to be.

(00:26):
More specifically.
Who do you want to be when youdie?
Right, that's what I said.
Who do you want to be when youdie?
It's a sobering question.
And it's probably a questionthat most people really don't

(00:50):
ask until they're forced to.
But what if that question becamethe foundation of your life now,
before the crisis, before theregrets, before the missed time

(01:11):
that you can't get back.
I don't mean how do you want tobe remembered?
That's really still about whatothers think, right?
This, what I'm talking about,isn't about reputation.

(01:32):
It's about integrity.
It's about who you're becomingin the quiet, in the process, in
the in-between.
The version of you that willface eternity.
Because at the end of your life,when all the noise fades, you

(01:55):
won't be asked what you built,how big your brand was, or how
busy you stayed?
You'll be asked something farmore important.
Did you become the person Godmade you to be?

(02:17):
Did you become the person thatyou were supposed to be in this
lifetime?
In my work that I do inpalliative medicine, I really am

(02:39):
so blessed and privileged to bewith patients and their families
at end of life, oftentimes inthe hospital work that I do and
the hospice work that I do inthe community.
I see those people.
I see who they have become asthey're dying.

(03:00):
And I can tell you that I havehad some of the most beautiful
experiences with people at endof life.
I get to hear and experience andsee the love that people have
for their loved one who's dying.
I hear stories about who theywere and what they did and what

(03:26):
they meant.
And sometimes I'll get theseopportunities to actually talk
with a patient while they'restill lucid enough.
You know, and I don't ever hear,and I don't think anyone will
ever hear from people that aredying that, man, I I wish I had
more stuff.
I wish I stayed at the office alittle bit longer.

(03:51):
I wish that I'd made more money.
I never hear that.
Never heard that.
Sometimes I've heard a lot ofregrets, sadly.
For the people that didn't focuson the things that really
mattered.
There's other times, sadly,where I encounter situations

(04:13):
where there won't be much familyaround.
Because of very strainedrelationships.
Maybe the person that I'mhelping, that I'm comforting at
the end of life didn't becomethe person that they were

(04:34):
created or destined to be.
And so in doing the kind of workthat I do, I get to be
reflective a lot.
I pause and I think and I'mreminded daily.
Am I on course?

(04:56):
Am I becoming the man that Iwant to be?
And asking myself, what am Idoing now toward that end?
Because here's the truth, myfriends, is that we're all dying

(05:17):
slowly, quietly.
We just live like we aren't.
We distract ourselves withgoals, with screens, with work,
and with success.
And we forget the most importantmetric of all.

(05:42):
Am I living in alignment withthe person I want to be at the
end of this life?
There's a verse in Ecclesiastesthat goes something like this.
It says, It's better to go to afuneral than a party, because

(06:03):
the living should take it toheart.
It's better to go to a funeralthan a party, because the living
should take it to heart.
Translation, death has a way ofclarifying life.
We spend so much time trying tobe successful, admired,

(06:24):
promoted, rich, famous.
But when it's all over, what doyou want your soul to say?
Not your resume, not yourfollowers, but your soul?

(06:47):
Let's simplify it.
When your time is up, do youwant to be known for being
productive or for being present?
Do you want to be remembered forhustle or for peace?
Do you want to be impressive orwhole?

(07:10):
Do you want to be a man or womanwho held everything tightly?
Or someone who surrenderedfreely?
The world is going to push foryou to be louder, faster,
bigger, better.
But I feel that the Spirit ofGod calls you to be faithful, to

(07:37):
be rooted, to be steady.
I wish I could say that I'mperfect in all of these
endeavors.
The truth is, none of us areperfect.
But again, it's not aboutperfection.
It's about a realization, it'sabout an awakening within
ourselves to realize what isthis life all about.

(08:04):
So let me ask you again.
Who do you want to be when youdie?
Not what do you want to bedoing, not what you hope to own,
not what title you'll carry.
Who do you want to be?

(08:26):
Maybe it sounds like this.
I want to be someone who livedopen-handed, someone who didn't
waste time proving, but pouredthemselves into serving others.
Maybe someone whose life madeheaven crowded, whose eyes fixed

(08:51):
on the things that lasted.
I want to be someone who forgavequickly, who loved deeply, who
didn't perform strength, butwalked humbly in it.
I want to be somebody who saidyes to God more than I said yes

(09:18):
to fear.
Someone who died to ego butstayed fully alive in purpose.
And maybe for you, the honestanswer is I'm not becoming that
person yet.
And that's okay.
That's the whole point of thisbrief episode, of this brief

(09:41):
encouragement.
It's to bring you back, torecenter, to reset.
Because transformation doesn'thappen in a weekend.
Doesn't happen in a moment.
You can't cram for the test atthe end of life.

(10:06):
It happens in the moments wherewe wake up and maybe make a
different decision.
Remember that it's the decisionsthat you make that determine
your destiny.
So take inventory today.
What in your life is making youmore like the person that you

(10:29):
want to be at the end of yourjourney?
And ask yourself, maybe what'staking you further from it?
You won't become, you cannotbecome that person by accident.
You become that person onpurpose.

(10:54):
Through surrender, throughobedience, through healing,
through staying close to the onewho made you.
One of my favorite scripturesthat reminds me of this: it's in
him that we live and move andhave our being.

(11:16):
Not in our image, not in ourgrind, not in our performance,
not in our bank account, not inour stuff, but in him.
He's the beginning.
He's the end.
And he's everything in between.

(11:38):
So, friends, I really want toencourage you, don't wait until
you're old and tired to becomewho you were created to be.
Don't wait until the finalchapter to live the story you
were actually meant to write.

(11:58):
Live now like someone who isalready free, who's already
whole, who's already clear.
Live now like someone who's notafraid of the ending.
Because when you know who youwant to be when you die, you

(12:20):
know exactly how to live.
Thanks, friends.
See you again soon.